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SUMMARY

* Assange takes chat-show job with Kremlin funded Russian TV

A TV channel funded by Kremlin will air a chat show hosted by the WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, in an unlikely collaboration announced yesterday. Russia Today, which broadcasts from Moscow in English, said that the programme will be written and hosted by Mr Assange, and will feature 10 guests who are "iconoclasts, visionaries and power insiders". Working for a Kremlin channel does not seem like an obvious choice for Mr Assange, who has devoted his life to fighting governmental opacity. There was no indication yesterday of whom Mr Assange might choose to interview for his 10-part series, but it is a safe bet to assume that Alexei Navalny, perhaps the closest thing Russia has to its own Assange figure, will not be getting an invite. Mr Navalny, an anti-corruption blogger who has exposed crooked schemes in companies close to the Kremlin, has come in for particular disdain from the state-funded broadcaster. One Click Note: Julian Assange is dogged by making bad choices and it is as yet too early to tell if this chat show hosted by RT is one such. Will Israel Shamir be on the guest list we ask? Meanwhile the WikiLeaks pipeline that once made the organisation a cause remains firmly shut. Assange's personal views do not count for much without it.
Shaun Walker, The Independent

* Wakefield sues BMJ over MMR articles

I just wish Mr Brian Deer had used his considerable talents to hound the committee responsible for introducing a vaccine, brands of which had already been withdrawn in other countries for causing neurological problems. I wish Mr Deer had used his time and energy to expose the people responsible for allowing the continued use of MMR vaccines when children were reported to have suffered problems in the opening weeks of the MMR campaign back in 1988. I wish he had used his efforts to expose the inadequacies of the Government's yellow card scheme which has been ineffective since it began. I would like to remind/inform your readers that the problems with MMR were known about by the UK Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation at least eight months before they sanctioned its use in the UK. The Government clearly were aware of the risks involved with the URABE containing vaccines (Pluserix and Immravax) before it was introduced and had the audacity to prepare an adverse publicity statement in readiness for what was potentially to come. In October 1997, four months before The Lancet publication, a meeting was held with the Health Minister and the Chief Medical Officer, Principal Medical Officer and other senior officers. The Health Minister was presented with details of some 1200 children and asked to instigate a clinical investigation into their ill health or death following MMR or MR vaccinations. This was never done.  Much money, time and effort has been spent on not studying these children.
Jackie Fletcher, JABS, British Medical Journal
Related Links:
* Dr Andrew Wakefield - Is this a rich Texan publicity stunt?
The One Click Group / Dr Andrew Wakefield Petition, Travis District Court
* Lancet Retracts Wakefield Et Al Paper After GMC Dishonesty Findings
Andrew Jack, The Financial Times
* Findings Of Fact - Summary, Wakefield et al
General Medical Council
* Findngs Of Fact - Full, Wakefield et al
General Medical Council

* Psychiatry’s Grand Confession - Serotonin Fraud

The psychiatry profession has finally come clean and confessed on a national media outlet that there is no evidence to support the Serotonin Theory of Depression. Today, on NPR’s Morning Edition there is a segment about the chemical imbalance theory, and virtually all the psychiatrists who are interviewed acknowledge that the there was never any evidence in support of the idea that low serotonin causes depression. But then, amazingly, they go on to say that it is perfectly fine to tell patients that serotonin imbalance causes depression even though they know this isn’t the case. But if the Psychiatry Community knew all along that the theory was not true, then why did they not clarify this issue for the general public? Shouldn’t they have pointed out to the general public and patients that what the pharmaceutical companies were saying about psychological stress was not true? Why did the professional societies not publicly set the record straight? Since the chemical imbalance theory is often presented as a rationale for taking SSRIs, such patients now understandably feel lied to by their clinicians.
Jonathan Leo, Ph.D. & Jeffrey Lacasse, Ph.D., Mad in America

* Non-Consenting Drug Trial Adults

A study testing emergency treatments enrols subjects without consent.
The Nuremberg Code, set up to protect the human subjects of research, is being routinely ignored. Today, the Nuremberg Code is the most important influence on U.S. law governing human medical research. Even so, marginalized groups have frequently been coerced into studies that violate their right to consent. A recent review of the bioethics of human research in the U.S. offers little prospect for change. In 1994, for example, the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston was accused of enrolling poor black women into narcotic-treatment research without their knowledge. The next year in Los Angeles, an experimental measles vaccine was tested on children, mostly black and Hispanic, without their parents' consent. In 1994 and 1995, New York City law enforcement officials helped researchers coerce black parents into enrolling their boys into a study that sought to establish a genetic propensity for violence, again without their consent.
Harriet A. Washington, Slate / New Scientist

* Atos shits in the dark tests

In the Eye's growing post-bag of appalling decisions made by French service company Atos in assessing sick and disabled people as being "fit for work", one of the most shocking concerns Keith Tilbury. Mr Tilbury (pictured) spent 13 days in a coma fighting for his life after he was accidentally shot in the stomach by a police firearms officer. Given his well-documented health records, Mr Tilbury, who had been a civilian emergency call centre operator, is trying to establish how on earth the Atos nurse or doctor — he is not sure which - could decide that he is fit to work without "dropping down dead" when there has been no improvement in his health since his last assessment. Like thousands of others, Mr Tilbury is having to go through the ordeal of appealing against the decision. He sees the box-ticking Atos test — drawn up with the help of the US insurance giant Unum, which was fined millions in the US for cheating its clients — as no more than a government tool to slash the benefits of people who through no fault of their own can no longer work.
In The Back, Private Eye

* Polio Vaccines Now The #1 Cause of Polio Paralysis

The Polio Global Eradication Initiative (PGEI) holds up India as a prime example of its success at eradicating polio, stating on its website (Jan. 11 2012) that "India has made unprecedented progress against polio in the last two years and on 13 January, 2012, India will reach a major milestone -- a 12-month period without any case of polio being recorded." This report, however, is highly misleading, as an estimated 100-180 Indian children are diagnosed with vaccine-associated polio paralysis (VAPP) each year.  According to the Polio Global Eradication Initiative's own statistics there were 42 cases of wild-type polio (WPV) reported in India in 2010, indicating that vaccine-induced cases of polio paralysis (100-180 annually) outnumber wild-type cases by a factor of 3-4. Even if we put aside the important question of whether or not the PGEI is accurately differentiating between wild and vaccine-associated polio cases in their statistics, we still must ask ourselves: should not the real-world effects of immunization, both good and bad, be included in PGEI's measurement of success? For the dozens of Indian children who develop vaccine-induced paralysis every year, the PGEI's recent declaration of India as nearing "polio free" status, is not only disingenuous, but could be considered an attempt to minimize their obvious liability in having transformed polio from a natural disease vector into a man-made (iatrogenic) one.
Sayer Ji, Activist Post
Related Links:
* WHO scandal: India announces polio vaccines are paralysing children
G.S. Mudur, The Calcutta Telegraph / The One Click Group
* Polio Vaccine Proven To Cause Spreading Polio Epidemics - Many Children Paralysed
Maria Cheng, Associated Press
* Polio Vaccine Causes Paralysis
Donald G McNeil Jr., The New York Times
* Over 78% Of Pakistan Children Struck Down With Polio Had Been Vaccinated
Sify News

* Dr Iain Stephenson found guilty of vaccine research fraud

Fraudster Dr Iain Stephenson, Consultant at University Hospital of Leicester NHS Trust
Who will ever forget the Swine Flu hysteria of 2009 that brought the British economy to a grinding halt as politicians and their medical advisors swamped the nation with vaccines and Tamiflu at the behest of the pharmaceutical industry? A key player in stoking this Swine Flu hysteria was Dr Iain Stephenson, a Consultant at University Hospital of Leicester NHS Trust who has been found guilty of vaccine research fraud on a grand scale by the General Medical Council (GMC). The GMC found that Stephenson was flagrantly dishonest. He tampered with research, forged multiple signatures, falsified the Vaccine Logs and lied about volunteers being given the flu vaccine as just  a mere flavour of this man's fraudulent activities. Even though the GMC stated that in relation to Dr Stephenson, "The Panel is not able to conclude with confidence that the risk of repetition of your misconduct is very unlikely," their judgement was that he should be suspended from his practice for a mere four months. It is small wonder that the general public is rapidly developing very little faith in vaccine research and the bodies that are supposed to control science misconduct. Despite the GMC showboating, their four month pat on the wrist for extensive vaccine research fraud speaks so very much louder than their words. Would you want your child vaccinated by this man in four month's time courtesy of the General Medical Council? And how many others are there just like him? The Retraction Watch website is doing a roaring trade.
The One Click Group / General Medical Council
Related Links:
* Dr Iain Stephenson, Determination Facts
General Medical Council
* Dr Iain Stephenson, Determination Impairment
General Medical Council
* Dr Iain Stephenson, Determination Sanction
General Medical Council

* Roche's Tamiflu scandal questions the entire process of systematic review

A new review of the influenza drug oseltamivir (Tamiflu) has raised questions about both the efficacy of the medication and the commitment of its maker to supply enough data for claims about the drug to be evaluated by independent experts. It also raises questions about the entire process of systematic review. Researchers led by Tom Jefferson, MD, of the Cochrane Collaboration, pored over 15 published studies and nearly 30,000 pages of "clinical study reports." But, they reported, the clinical study information – data previously shared only with regulators – was only a part of what internal evidence suggested was available. And many published studies had to be excluded because of missing or contradictory data, Jefferson and colleagues reported.  "What we're seeing is largely Chapter One and Chapter Two of reports that usually have four or five chapters," according to the BMJ article's lead author, Peter Doshi, PhD, of Johns Hopkins University. Roche did not immediately respond to a telephoned request for comment. One Click Note: At the height of the Swine Flu 'pandemic', the UK Labour government closed down Britain by creating Swine Flu hysteria to take the electorate's mind off the banking crisis. Tamiflu Call Centres staffed by previously unemployed sixteen year olds swamped the nation with this drug for which adverse reactions were already a matter of fact and record, not to say notorious. People were disabled by this drug.  The moral of this story is that governments and their big medical business cronies frequently do not know best.
Michael Smith, North American Correspondent, MedPage Today
Related Links:
* Side effects and effectiveness of 'wonder-drug' Tamiflu under the microscope as Department of Health faces awkward questions over mass prescriptions
Daily Mail Reporter, Daily Mail
* 14 Year-Old Boy Jumps From Apartment Window After Taking Tamiflu
BERNAMA, Malaysian National News Agency
* Fatal Reactions And Injuries Occurring With Tamiflu 'Swine Flu' Drug
Jeremy Laurance, New Zealand Herald
* US reviews risks of Tamiflu after 12 children die
Jeremy Laurance, The Independent

* Children damaged by GSK Swine Flu vaccine demand compensation for permanent harm

Those patients who have been diagnosed with narcolepsy after getting the H1N1 vaccination [Pandemrix, GlaxoSmithKline] are dissatisfied with the compensations they have received. They say that the compensations do not correspond to the damage caused. A total of 78 children and young people contracted narcolepsy in Finland after having been vaccinated for the H1N1 or swine flu virus during the pandemic of 2009. A group of lawyers say that the impairments sustained by those 45 patients they represent have been found to be permanent, and yet a less severe ground for compensation has been used. When processing the applications, the Finnish Pharmaceutical Insurance Pool has interpreted the claims for damages in a way that does not correspond to the real situation, the families of the patients claim. The handling of permanent harm suffered by the narcolepsy patients is delayed excessively, the families charge.
Helsingin Sanomat
Related Links:
* Compensation for GlaxoSmithKline swine flu vaccine victims
Helsingin Sanomat
* Doctors Must Return GlaxoSmithKline Swine Flu Vaccines Causing Narcolepsy
Jerome Reilly, Independent.ie
* Rise In Narcolepsy Cases From GSK Swine Flu Vaccine
Jerome Reilly, Independent.ie
* Swedish data: GSK flu vaccine causes narcolepsy and catalepsy in children
Robert Roos, CIDRAP

* UK Swine flu drug policy criticised by Birmingham doctors

The government's reaction to a swine flu outbreak may have done "more harm than good" according to two doctors. Dr Jacky Chambers and Dr Andrew Rouse helped deal with the first cases of swine flu in Birmingham in 2009. In the journal Health and Place, they claim giving anti-viral drugs to healthy children as a preventive measure lacked scientific evidence. The report claims that giving antivirals like Tamiflu to healthy children as a preventive measure was never part of the plan before the epidemic and the decision lacked scientific evidence. Dr Chambers said there were some "major ethical questions" about what they were asked to do. The doctors claim that the government relied on academic modellers to predict the progress of the disease rather than asking experts on the ground. Dr Rouse said: "I do believe that they did more harm than good - I can't imagine that the special arrangements saved anybody's life or even saved a day of sickness." The doctors said they fear that current government plans for a national public health service called Public Health England could make matters worse in future by making local health experts directly accountable to the Secretary of State for Health.
Michele Paduano, BBC News

* Philosophical Exemption Under Attack in Vermont

NVIC's Vaccine Awareness Ad Running in Times Square - 1/14/12!
There is a serious threat to the philosophical exemption to vaccination in Vermont. Two bills (S.199 and H. 527) backed by 15 legislators in the Vermont state House and Senate propose to eliminate the philosophical exemption to vaccination for children attending school or college. Vermont is one of 18 states in the U.S. that allows a philosophical, personal or conscientious belief exemption to vaccination. Vermont is ranked first as the “healthiest” state, according to America’s Health Rankings and has a low infectious disease rate. States that currently have a philosophical/conscientious belief exemption are: CA, ID, WA, MI, UT, AZ, MN, WI, OH, CO, NM, ND, OK, TX, AR, LA, ME and VT. “We know that the Pharma/Medical Trade Association lobby is planning to mount an all-out effort this year to persuade state legislators to strip philosophical/conscientious belief exemptions to vaccination from state public health laws. NVIC is calling on all concerned citizens and organizations in the state of Vermont – and every state – to get involved and take action to protect the right to voluntary, informed consent to vaccination in America,” said NVIC co-founder and president, Barbara Loe Fisher.
Information Release, National Vaccine Information Center

* Thousands of women at risk from 'silent Thalidomide'

A drug intended to prevent miscarriage is blamed for causing cancer in the daughters – and possibly even granddaughters – of women who took it decades ago. Tens of thousands of British families are to be asked if they are victims of a drug given to pregnant women which can cause fatal illness in the second, and possibly even third, generations. Some women given the drug in this country have already obtained compensation in America. Diethylstilboestrol (DES), a drug given to women for 30 years up to 1973, has been found to cause a rare form of vaginal and cervical cancer in some of the daughters of the women who took it, as well as fertility problems. Compensation of an estimated $1.5bn has been paid out in the US. There is even a suspicion that DES – known as the "silent Thalidomide" – can affect the grandchildren of those who took it. Legal action against the 14 different drug companies that sold and promoted DES from the early 1940s to 1970s is being brought by at least 80 women in the US, who all believe that the synthetic form of oestrogen, given to their mothers in an effort to reduce miscarriages, caused them to develop breast cancer years later. Their lawyer, Aaron Levine, will travel to the UK in two weeks' time to co-ordinate a hunt for the "DES daughters" in this country who have been unable to get compensation in British courts.
Sarah Morrison & Jaymi McCann, The Independent

* The Shaky Science of Shaken Baby Syndrome

Shaken baby syndrome presents a terrifying dilemma to the criminal justice system: a false conviction leaves a grieving parent or other innocent in prison for years while an undeserved exoneration could allow a dangerous child abuser to kill again. Unfortunately, the medical science used to determine the cause of death in infants suspected of being shaken to death is far from precise, and certainly not conducive to the simple “guilty” or “not guilty” decisions that courts require. In a highly contested case heard by the Supreme Court last fall, the original guilty verdict against grandmother Shirley Ree Smith for having shaken her grandson to death was overturned by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which said there was “no physical evidence” and “no demonstrable support” for the conviction.
Maia Szalavitz, Time Magazine

* Doctors must accept they're no longer gods

Just a doctor, not a God
Does a doctor have a profession or a vocation? The answer is in today's Telegraph splash: the doctors who propose to strike over cuts to their pension pots make it clear that they look on their work as a nice little earner – the average GP earns £110,000 a year – rather than a whole-hearted vocation. This image conferred special privileges – not only a hefty salary (several times that of other "caring" professionals such as teachers) but membership of a breed that offered protection well beyond, some claimed, that enjoyed by other professions: as a Commons health select committee argued last summer, the General Medical Council allowed doctors to get away with… well, if not murder, then malpractice. This Masonic mentality was allied to a neurotic fear of initiatives that might threaten the profession. Sorry, doctors. You must climb down from your pedestal. You're no longer gods.
Cristina Odone, The Telegraph

* Sunshine Law Requires Drug Companies to Report $$ to Doctors

Finally, a meaningful, sunshine law to foster accountability by removing the veil of secrecy that has corrupted medical research and medical practice, is in the final stages before taking effect.  The law is intended to protect consumers from expensive, often ineffective and / or unnecessary healthcare products that doctors with undisclosed financial interests in those products recommend.  The law requires manufacturers of prescription drugs and medical devices to report ALL PAYMENTS  made to doctors and teaching hospitals--including royalty payments, payments for research, consulting fees, speakers fees, travel and entertainment! The law also requires drug and device companies to report the amount of “any ownership or investment interest” held by doctors or their immediate family members, other than holdings of publicly traded stocks. Yet to be addressed, is the second most important, essential sunshine requirement needed to protect consumers from useless and hazardous medical products is a mandatory registry at which ALL medical research findings are posted--both negative and positive findings-- so that independent analysts who have no financial stake in the products, can evaluate the medical value and safety of prescription drugs and medical devices.  Such a database should include both industry-initiated and publicly supported medical research.
Vera Hassner Sharav, AHRP / Robert Pear, The New York Times

* It’s time to end the failed war on drugs

The war on drugs has been a costly failure, says Sir Richard Branson
Just as prohibition of alcohol failed in the United States in the 1920s, the war on drugs has failed globally. Over the past 50 years, more than $1 trillion has been spent fighting this battle, and all we have to show for it is increased drug use, overflowing jails, billions of pounds and dollars of taxpayers’ money wasted, and thriving crime syndicates. It is time for a new approach. Too many of our leaders worldwide are ignoring policy reforms that could rapidly reduce violence and organised crime, cut down on theft, improve public health and reduce the use of illicit drugs. They are failing to act because the reforms that are needed centre on decriminalising drug use and treating it as a health problem. Unless this issue is tackled now, countless individuals and families will continue to suffer, no matter how much money is spent. We need a debate on how policy can cut consumption and reduce harm, rather than inflammatory scaremongering. It is not about supporting drug use; it is about solving a crisis. For all the successes I’ve had in business, I’ve also learnt to accept when things go wrong, work out why, and try to find a better way. The war on drugs is a failed enterprise. We need to have the courage to learn the lessons and move on.
Sir Richard Branson, Daily Telegraph
Related Links:
* War On Drugs
Report of the Global Commission on Drug Policy
* Big Government Breaks Bad in Drug War
Tom Barry, CounterPunch
* Prohibition: A parallel to modern war on drugs
Norm Stamper, The Seattle Times
* New FBI Numbers Reveal Failure Of 'War On Drugs'
Mark Perry, Daily Markets
* Ending the War on Drugs would help to fix the budget
E.D. Kain, Forbes

* Anger at Bent Britain Tories over lobbying 'whitewash'

Senior Conservative ministers blocked plans for the reform of Britain's discredited lobbying industry.
After over a year of deliberations, the Government published its consultation on proposals to create a statutory register of lobbyists yesterday. But campaigners said the plans were "fundamentally flawed" and would do nothing to clean up the industry's reputation in the wake of revelations about the unhealthy links between senior politicians and leading lobbying firms. Under the proposals, companies that employ lobbyists directly will not be required to register their work on a new statutory register of lobbyists. Neither will lobbyists have to declare which areas of policy they are hoping to influence or declare how much they are paid for their work, because this would provide "too great an administrative burden". Ministers will not be required to declare why they are meeting lobbyists or which firms or groups they are representing. Instead only third-party lobbying firms will have to declare their clients on a register and record which former ministers and government officials they have on their books. There would be no fines for failure to comply. "They are a nonsense," said Tamasin Cave from the Alliance for Lobbying Transparency, an organisation representing a number of charities, unions and campaign groups. "They are fundamentally flawed and have the lobbyists' fingerprints all over them."
Oliver Wright, The Independent
Related Links:
* Lobbyist Lord Chadlington denies giving money to Tories – but accounts tell a different story
Oliver Wright, The Independent
* PR uncovered: Top lobbyists boast of how they influence the UK Prime Minister
Melanie Newman, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism
* Rebekah Brooks? 'We helped choose her police station' says Bell Pottinger
Oliver Duff, The Independent

* Man in coma loses benefits as ATOS classifies him fit for work

The government's decision to crack down on the disabled took a bizarre turn this week after a man in a coma was stripped of his benefits - because he'd not handed his fitness-for-work questionnaire in. In a thread on rightsnet.org.uk on Thursday Reading Community Welfare Rights Unit deputy manager Sam Harney noted: Client’s husband is in hospital in a coma. He was sent ESA501. Client contacted DWP to explain situation and was asked to obtain letter from hospital confirming he is in a coma. Did so. Was told to send it to ATOS rather than local BDC. Did so. Husband has now received decision letter – yep, as he has failed to return the ESA50 without good cause and is therefore capable of work [he is] no longer entitled to ESA… The decision is part of a lengthening list of seemingly nonsensical judgements handed down by ATOS healthcare since it was appointed to oversee benefits claims in 2005. The firm has been targeted repeatedly over the last few years by campaigners under the banner ATOS KILLS, with activists pointing to a sharp rise in applications against the decisions being made, with 40% of appeals being successful overall rising to 70% where legal representation is used.
Rob Ray, libcom.org
Related Links:
* People are dying during wait for Atos chaos benefits judgement
Kate Devlin, The Herald
* Bent ATOS Britain and UNUM Insurance, A Country of Second Chances
Black Triangle Campaign
* Al Jazeera Exposes ATOS Healthcare
Al Jazeera, The Stream
 * ATOS Healthcare bludgeons its UK critics
Will Stone, Morning Star

* Cameron is the David Brent of welfare reform

Those who know him only as the ribald host of the Golden Globes in Hollywood will be unaware that Ricky Gervais was once Britain's most strikingly prescient socio-political satirist. Long before last year's outbreak of "mong" warfare on Twitter, Gervais produced an uncannily accurate predictive metaphor for the Tory attitude towards the disabled, on view this week as the Welfare Reform Bill wended its contentious way through the Lords. The only freedom the Government has in mind, in seeking to have this benefit reduced or removed by the decision of private firm employees under huge pressure to find reasons to do so, is the freedom from caring adequately for its most vulnerable. To save less than £1bn per annum (the cost of a few fighter jets) from an almost £2 trillion economy, the lives of some 600,000 disabled people and more still of those who look after them would become far bleaker. What a metaphor for the Tory take on the austerity age it is, this vista of the wealthy targeting a trifling saving by depriving those who need it most of the sort of weekly sum Lord Freud can claim in allowances for attending the Lords for one day. One Click Note:  Disability Living Allowance (DLA) fraud currently stands at O.5%. Never let the facts get in the way of robbing the poor to pay for the rich, though eh? Read this coruscating article from Matthew Norman. UK Prime Minister David Cameron is an utterly chilling galaxy class hypocrite.
Matthew Norman, The Independent
Related Links:
*  A Report on the proposed changes to Disability Living Allowance
Responsible Reform
Dr S J Campbell BSc (Hons) PhD et al
* London Mayor Boris Johnson victim of DLA con trick
Steve Donnison, Benefits and Work

* Illness as 'Deviance', Strategies for Getting The Sick 'Back to Work'

Chris Grayling
An ongoing British government mission of ‘inclusivity’ which has sought to draw into paid employment those previously depicted as ‘excluded’ by conditions of personal circumstance, such as lone mothers, or through lack of ‘skills’ such as NEETS, or to some extent disabled and older claimants, has recently been expanded much further, venturing into territory previously delimited by, and existing under the protection of, certain ‘norms’ – that is the widespread area of sickness and disability. Characteristic of government rhetoric towards an end of ‘including’ the sick and disabled within the work-not-welfare paradigm is the adoption of an ‘abandonment’ discourse when referring to those on long-term health-related benefits (Grayling, quoted in BBC, 2011) – work being posed as their ‘salvation’. Those activists who have adopted the symbol of the ‘Black Triangle’, with its connotations of a sick and disabled community that were vilified through their depiction as arbeitsscheu (work-shy), also remind us that a means by which that regime concealed their abuses was through an emphasis on the idea of the supposedly ‘liberating’ potential of work. The most deplorable aspect of the dominance of this official discourse has been the way in which it works to conceal the real nature of sickness and disability, and the hard work that sufferers must already do to bridge the gap between their impairments and an involvement in everyday life which the able-bodied take for granted.
Gill Thorburn, Democratic Green Socialist

* WHO scandal: India announces polio vaccines are paralysing children  

India’s health ministry now faces a dilemma that public health experts had predicted years ago: the very vaccine it is using to fight polio is causing more polio paralysis than the wild poliovirus. Surveillance data show that last year, seven children in India developed polio from vaccine-derived poliovirus (VDPV), the medical term for a virus from the oral polio vaccine (OPV) that has regained the ability to cause disease. Such infections occur when virus from the OPV, after being excreted by vaccinated children, regains neuro-virulence and the ability to circulate in the environment and strikes other vulnerable children. Public health experts also estimate that between 100 and 180 children in India develop vaccine-associated polio paralysis (VAPP) each year, a  serious side effect of the OPV they had received to protect them from the wild poliovirus. As opposed to VDPV infection, VAPP affects the vaccinated children themselves. One Click Note: As the World Health Organisation lies through its pharma stoked teeth claiming a polio-free India in an attempt to con the public, it is deliberately evading the fact that not only is vaccine-induced polio spreading without check in India, but the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Nigeria, Congo, Somalia and Ethiopia to name but six other countries besides. Vaccine-induced polio is no respecter of borders, just as the WHO is no respecter of truth.  Children are becoming paralysed from the very vaccine that is supposed to protect them in India and everywhere else. This is one of the great vaccine scandals of the decade and growing every year. Courage to those doctors and journalists reporting it.
G.S. Mudur, The Calcutta Telegraph / The One Click Group
Related Links:
* Polio Vaccine Proven To Cause Spreading Polio Epidemics - Many Children Paralysed
Maria Cheng, Associated Press
* Polio Vaccine Causes Paralysis
Donald G McNeil Jr., The New York Times
* Over 78% Of Pakistan Children Struck Down With Polio Had Been Vaccinated
Sify News

* The spectrum of ASIA induced by Adjuvants [vaccines]

During the past year a new syndrome was introduced and termed ASIA, ‘Autoimmune (Auto-inflammatory) Syndrome induced by Adjuvants’. This syndrome assembles a spectrum of immune-mediated diseases triggered by an adjuvant stimulus. The use of medical adjuvants has become common practice and substances such as aluminum adjuvant are added to most human and animal vaccines, while the adjuvant silicone is extensively used for breast implants and cosmetic procedures. A cornerstone of ASIA is the complex interaction between autoimmunity and adjuvanted vaccines.
N Agmon-Levin, GRV Hughes & Y Shoenfeld, Lupus DOI: 10.1177/0961203311429316, Sage Journals
Related Links:
* Mechanisms of Aluminum Adjuvant Toxicity and Autoimmunity in Pediatric Populations
FULL TEXT
L Tomljenovic & CA Shaw, Lupus, Sage Journals
* New Adjuvanted Vaccines in Pregnancy: What is Known About Their Safety?
FULL TEXT
Carla Herberts et al, Expert Rev Vaccines. 2010;9(12):1411-1422

* Thousands struck down by widely prescribed swine flu drug Roche Tamiflu

Thousands of people in Britain who took Tamiflu during the swine flu pandemic may have suffered a string of side-effects they were not warned about, it has been revealed. 14 new adverse reactions were added to the drug’s profile in November – more than two years after the scare. Among the conditions are back, joint and muscle aches, fever, menstrual pain, herpes, sinusitis and earache. These revelations come as a team of the world’s leading scientists prepare to release a report about the drug’s safety and effectiveness. The renowned Cochrane Collaboration is set to release its findings on Wednesday and will claim that the drug’s makers, Roche, withheld vital data during its investigation. Several patients are also said to be preparing legal action after suffering alleged reactions. One Click Note: Year after year, the adverse  effects of the Tamiflu drug, including deaths of children, have been reported around the world. And equally year after year, doctors prescribe this dangerous drug at the behest of the drug licensing industry. With Swine Flu recorded as one of the mildest flu's on record, there is far more danger inherent in taking these drugs and the Swine Flu vaccines than there is in contracting the flu itself. How many people will be killed and maimed by Tamiflu before doctors and the drug licensing authorities finally sit up and pay attention? This is a rhetorical question.
ZEENEWS.com / The One Click Group
Related Links:
* 14 Year-Old Boy Jumps From Apartment Window After Taking Tamiflu
BERNAMA, Malaysian National News Agency
* Fatal Reactions And Injuries Occurring With Tamiflu 'Swine Flu' Drug
Jeremy Laurance, New Zealand Herald
* US reviews risks of Tamiflu after 12 children die
Jeremy Laurance, The Independent

* Satellite engineer loses use of legs four days after taking Tamiflu

ABOVE: Neil Goodwin says he is a “shell” of his old self
A Dad fears swine flu drug Tamiflu left him paralysed. Former satellite engineer Neil Goodwin was prescribed the anti-viral over the phone during the 2009 swine flu pandemic. Neil says that days after taking the drug he had to be rushed to hospital after losing the movement in his legs. According to the 39-year-old he later became “completely paralysed” and was diagnosed with a nervous system disorder. Now, more than two years later, Neil is a “shell” of his former self. Although he has regained movement in much of his body, he cannot walk for more than three minutes without feeling “absolutely shattered”. Since the swine flu pandemic, Neil believes the drug should never have been prescribed over the phone. More than 1.6million were authorised to take the drug by phone or after internet diagnosis.
Jonathan Corke, Daily Star
Related Links:
* Roche's Tamiflu drug is useless, states professor
CBC News, Canada
* 98% resistance to Tamiflu found in U.S. samples
CBC News, Canada

* No magic bullet on the flu: pharmaceutical industry cons the public

Pharmacist Marty Feltner handles boxes of the antiviral drug Tamiflu at Kohll's  
Pharmacy in Omaha, Neb.
You can imagine our surprise when just a few months ago, while browsing through an  article titled "Reckless Medicine" in the magazine Discover, we came upon an astounding story. After reviewing studies of Tamiflu during the avian flu scare, Dr. Tom Jefferson of the Cochrane Collaboration, a nonprofit group dedicated to analyzing medical evidence, had concluded in a 2006 report that the drug was effective. "But," said the article, "several years later, another physician challenged that conclusion because 8 of 10 studies in a meta-analysis — a review of studies — that Jefferson relied on had never been published." That prompted Jefferson to seek the raw data. "He was stymied when several authors and the manufacturer gave one excuse after another for why it couldn't supply the actual data. Jefferson's concern turned to outrage when two employees of a communications company … [revealed] they had been paid to ghostwrite some of the Tamiflu studies [and] had been given explicit instructions to ensure that a key message was embedded in the articles: Flu is a threat, and Tamiflu is the answer. "After reanalyzing the raw data finally made available (they still don't have it all), Jefferson and his colleagues published their  
review [in December 2009], saying that once the unpublished studies were excluded, there was no proof that Tamiflu reduced serious flu complications like pneumonia or death." In short, it appears the pharmaceutical companies had been as cunning in conning the public on matters of health as Wall Street had been on matters of wealth.
David Finkelstein, Los Angeles Times
Related Links:
* New Study Shows Flu Vaccines Are Futile Rubbish
Tom Blackwell, National Post

One Click Note: Julian Assange is dogged by making bad choices and it is as yet too early to tell if this chat show hosted by RT is one such. Will Israel Shamir be on the guest list we ask? Meanwhile the WikiLeaks pipeline that once made the organisation a cause remains firmly shut. Assange's personal views do not count for much without it.

Assange takes chat-show job with state-funded Russian TV

Psychiatry’s Grand Confession

Posted on January 23, 2012 by Jonathan Leo, Ph.D. / Jeffrey Lacasse, Ph.D.

The psychiatry profession has finally come clean and confessed on a national media outlet that there is no evidence to support the Serotonin Theory of Depression. Today, on NPR’s Morning Edition there is a segment about the chemical imbalance theory, and virtually all the psychiatrists who are interviewed acknowledge that the there was never any evidence in support of the idea that low serotonin causes depression. But then, amazingly, they go on to say that it is perfectly fine to tell patients that serotonin imbalance causes depression even though they know this isn’t the case.

Several years ago in PLoS Medicine we wrote a long piece about the serotonin theory and the disconnect between what research psychiatrists say in professional journals and textbooks and what the advertisements say. While the advertisements presented the theory as scientific fact, the scientific sources clearly did not. Given the enormous marketing programs that pushed this theory combined with the media’s lack of skepticism, we were sympathetic to the general public who could hardly be faulted for thinking that theory had some foundation in fact. Following the publication of our piece a reporter contacted us and suggested that we were attacking a well accepted theory. We pointed out to the reporter that we weren’t attacking a sacred cow but that instead we were pointing out the mainstream psychiatry didn’t even accept this theory. We urged the reporter to contact the FDA, NIMH, APA, etc and ask them about the science behind the advertisements. He did, and as expected, an expert from the FDA explained that the theory was really just a metaphor. The problem is that patients who heard their physician explain the serotonin theory thought they were hearing real science. They weren’t told it was a metaphor and hence thought it was a fact. When a doctor talks about high cholesterol, diabetes, or hypothyroidism, they are talking about scientific measurement, not a metaphor. How is a patient with high cholesterol and depression who listens to their doctor’s explanation of their conditions supposed to know when the doctor has moved from science to metaphor?

Several months ago Ronald Pies published an interesting article in Psychiatric Times entitled, “Psychiatry’s New Brain-Mind and the Legend of the Chemical Imbalance.” Pies, just like the experts on NPR, acknowledges that the Chemical Imbalance theory is not true. However, according to Pies, it was the pharmaceutical companies who espoused the theory, and not well-informed, practicing clinicians, because the psychiatry community has known all along that the theory is not true.

But if the Psychiatry Community knew all along that the theory was not true, then why did they not clarify this issue for the general public? Shouldn’t they have pointed out to the general public and patients that what the pharmaceutical companies were saying about psychological stress was not true? Why did the professional societies not publicly set the record straight?

There are many angry comments on the NPR website. These comments are interesting, because apparently many patients who were told that depression is caused by a chemical imbalance never understood that were hearing a metaphor and not science. Since the chemical imbalance theory is often presented as a rationale for taking SSRIs, such patients now understandably feel lied to by their clinicians.

Perhaps the most interesting part about the NPR piece is that the reporter seems to not understand that the idea of telling a falsehood to patients because you think it is good for them is a serious violation of informed consent. Shouldn’t the reporter have asked the obvious questions, such as:

1) Do you feel it is acceptable to present a scientific theory as fact even though you know it is false?
2) Is it okay for psychiatrists to tell patients stories about their conditions that psychiatrists know are false?
3) Is there not an ethical issue when a psychiatrist informs their patient that they have a serotonin imbalance, when the medical textbooks on the shelf clearly say this is a falsified theory?

In general, we are fans of NPR, but hopefully the next news outlet that covers this topic will be more investigative in their approach.

Non-Consenting Adults

The Nuremberg Code, set up to protect the human subjects of research, is being routinely ignored.

By Harriet A. Washington| Posted  Jan. 22, 2012

A study testing emergency treatments enrolls subjects without consent

www.private-eye.co.uk

No. 1306
27 January 2012 -
9 February 2012

January 18, 2012

Polio Vaccines Now The #1 Cause of Polio Paralysis

Sayer Ji, Contributing Writer

The Polio Global Eradication Initiative (PGEI), founded in 1988 by the World Health Organization, Rotary International, UNICEF, and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, holds up India as a prime example of its success at eradicating polio, stating on its website (Jan. 11 2012) that "India has made unprecedented progress against polio in the last two years and on 13 January, 2012, India will reach a major milestone -- a 12-month period without any case of polio being recorded."

This report, however, is highly misleading, as an estimated 100-180 Indian children are diagnosed with vaccine-associated polio paralysis (VAPP) each year. In fact, the clinical presentation of the disease, including paralysis, caused by VAPP is indistinguishable from that caused by wild polioviruses, making the PGEI's pronouncements all the more suspect.¹

According to the Polio Global Eradication Initiative's own statistics² there were 42 cases of wild-type polio (WPV) reported in India in 2010, indicating that vaccine-induced cases of polio paralysis (100-180 annually) outnumber wild-type cases by a factor of 3-4. Even if we put aside the important question of whether or not the PGEI is accurately differentiating between wild and vaccine-associated polio cases in their statistics, we still must ask ourselves: should not the real-world effects of immunization, both good and bad, be included in PGEI's measurement of success? For the dozens of Indian children who develop vaccine-induced paralysis every year, the PGEI's recent declaration of India as nearing "polio free" status, is not only disingenuous, but could be considered an attempt to minimize their obvious liability in having transformed polio from a natural disease vector into a man-made (iatrogenic) one.

VAPP is, in fact, the predominant form of the disease in developed countries like the US since 1973.³  The problem of vaccine-induced polio paralysis was so severe that the The United States moved to the inactivated poliovirus vaccine (IPV) in 2000, after the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) recommended altogether eliminating the live-virus oral polio vaccine (OPV), which is still used throughout the third world, despite the known risks.

Polio underscores the need for a change in the way we look at so-called "vaccine preventable" diseases as a whole. In most people with a healthy immune system, a poliovirus infection does not even generate symptoms. Only rarely does the infection produce minor symptoms, e.g. sore throat, fever, gastrointestinal disturbances, and influenza-like illness. In only 3% of infections does virus gain entry to the central nervous system, and then, in only 1-5 in 1000 cases does the infection progress to paralytic disease.

Due to the fact that polio spreads through the fecal-oral route (i.e. the virus is transmitted from the stool of an infected person to the mouth of another person through a contaminated object, e.g. utensil) focusing on hygiene, sanitation and proper nutrition (to support innate immunity) is a logical way to prevent transmission in the first place, as well as reducing morbidity associated with an infection when it does occur.

Instead, a large portion of the world's vaccines are given to the Third World as "charity," when the underlying conditions of economic impoverishment, poor nutrition, chemical exposures, and socio-political unrest are never addressed. You simply can't vaccinate people out of these conditions, and as India's new epidemic of vaccine-induced polio cases clearly demonstrates, the "cure" may be far worse than the disease itself.

¹ Cono J, Alexander LN (2002). "Chapter 10: Poliomyelitis" (PDF). Vaccine-Preventable Disease Surveillance Manual.
² http://www.polioeradication.org/Dataandmonitoring/Poliothisweek.aspx
³Strebel PM, Sutter RW, Cochi SL, et al. Epidemiology of poliomyelitis in the United States one decade after the last reported case of indigenous wild virus-associated disease. Clin Infect Dis 1992;14:568-79.

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Related Links:
* WHO scandal: India announces polio vaccines are paralysing children
G.S. Mudur, The Calcutta Telegraph / The One Click Group
* Polio Vaccine Proven To Cause Spreading Polio Epidemics - Many Children Paralysed
Maria Cheng, Associated Press
* Polio Vaccine Causes Paralysis
Donald G McNeil Jr., The New York Times
* Over 78% Of Pakistan Children Struck Down With Polio Had Been Vaccinated
Sify News
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23 January 2012

Dr Iain Stephenson found guilty of vaccine research fraud

Who will ever forget the Swine Flu hysteria of 2009 that brought the British economy to a grinding halt as politicians and their medical advisors swamped the nation with vaccines and Tamiflu at the behest of the pharmaceutical industry?

Fraudster Dr Iain Stephenso, Consultant at University Hospital of Leicester NHS Trust

A key player in stoking this Swine Flu hysteria was Dr Iain Stephenson, a Consultant at University Hospital of Leicester NHS Trust who has been found guilty of vaccine research fraud on a grand scale by the General Medical Council (GMC).

Prior to being caught, Stephenson used the media extensively to promote his flu vaccine work including The Lancet, BBC and local Leicester press. Amongst his other initiatives, Stephenson produced what he claimed was the world-first Swine Flu vaccine trial.

The GMC found that Stephenson was flagrantly dishonest and compounded the situation by acting dishonestly in a number of ways. He breached a fundamental tenet of his profession and put patients at harm. He tampered with research, forged multiple signatures, falsified the Vaccine Logs and lied about volunteers being given the vaccine. The foregoing is a mere flavour of this man's fraudulent activities. Even when under investigation, Stephenson went so far as to ask a colleague to backdate his signature.  

If you were to imagine that such serious research fraud and a vote of no confidence would attract the appropriate penalty, you would be sorely mistaken. "Dishonesty, by its very nature, can be difficult to remediate," said the GMC in Stephenson's case. "The Panel is not able to conclude with confidence that the risk of repetition of your misconduct is very unlikely." And so what did the GMC actually conclude? That Stephenson should be suspended from his practice for a mere four months.

See below the small article on this case produced by the British Medical Journal's Clare Dyer that attempts to go some way to mitigating this fraud. And then read the rest of material from the GMC published below.

It is small wonder that the general public is rapidly developing very little faith in vaccine research and the bodies that are supposed to control science misconduct. Despite the GMC showboating, their four month pat on the wrist for extensive vaccine research fraud speaks so very much louder than their words.

Would you want your child vaccinated by this man in four month's time courtesy of the General Medical Council? And how many others are there just like him? The Retraction Watch website is doing a roaring trade.

The One Click Group
23 January 2012
 

BMJ 2012;344:e457 doi: 10.1136/bmj.e457 (Published 16 January 2012)

Flu vaccine investigator is suspended for four months for research fraud

By Clare Dyer

A researcher on flu vaccines who forged colleagues’ signatures, asked a nurse to sign a false declaration, and recruited himself into a study under a disguised name has been suspended from practice for four months for research fraud.

Iain Stephenson, honorary consultant physician at the University Hospital of Leicester NHS Trust and a clinical senior lecturer at Leicester University, was the principal investigator in one study, an open label study, and a co-investigator in a second, known as the “prime boost study.”

Dr Stephenson’s actions, which also included destroying an original log sheet and replacing it with new sheets, were dishonest on a number of occasions and amounted to research fraud, a General Medical Council fitness to practise panel held.

Dr Stephenson admitted forging the signature of a colleague, Tristan Clark, six times on the vaccine log for the open label study and forging the signatures of Dr Clark and Karl Nicholson, professor of infectious diseases at Leicester, on their curriculum vitae in the study file

The panel found that Dr Stephenson had recruited three volunteers into both the open label study and the prime boost study but “went to some lengths” to disguise this. He recorded that the three had been given the open label vaccine, when they had received only the vaccine for the prime boost study.

He admitted recording that the three volunteers had had the open label vaccine when they had not, asking the nurse to countersign the vaccine log, and forging Dr Clark’s countersignature.

READ FULL TEXT....

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Related Links:
* Dr Iain Stephenson, Determination Facts
General Medical Council
* Dr Iain Stephenson, Determination Impairment
General Medical Council
* Dr Iain Stephenson, Determination Sanction
General Medical Council
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Dr Iain Stephenson, Admitted Found Proven v2-3.1.12, GMC